If any Hollywood scriptwriters are looking for inspiration for a fresh road movie, they could do themselves a favour by calling Micah Noble.

In probably the best story to come out of B.C. Craft Beer Month this October, the CEO of Kooner Hospitality Group, which owns three pubs and three liquor stores in the Lower Mainland, recently embarked on a 2,000-kilometre craft-beer pilgrimage across the province in a bid to bring some lesser-known brews back to Metro Vancouver.

Noble, together with 16th Street Liquor Store manager Chris Funnell, hopped into a three-tonne truck one September morning with a detailed itinerary that would take them to Tofino, back through Vancouver to Osoyoos, then back home again via Salmon Arm in just four days.

Of course, even the most perfectly planned itinerary is destined to be torn up – but all that means is that Noble and Funnell are now set up with anecdotes for the foreseeable future.

“It took a little longer than expected,” Noble told me over the phone of the cross-province beer run.

“We left on the Tuesday morning and discovered there was a wee bit more of a commercial wait for large three-tonne trucks to get on the ferry. So, slight delay getting into Nanaimo.

“Then one of the breweries we were chatting with said the beer wouldn’t be ready ’til the afternoon. But we were on a tight schedule so we picked up beer from Longwood brewpub, which was our first stop [in Nanaimo], then we drove straight to Tofino.

“Met with the guys there, saw a bit of the town, slept for a few hours, then headed back to Nanaimo. And again there was a small delay there because we lost the brakes to the truck outside of Parksville coming down a hill.”

Noble and his team first began calling round breweries across the province in August, as planning for B.C. Craft Beer Month in October was well underway.

Kegs of fresh beer were the ideal, though they would settle for bottles or cans of beer that don’t often (or ever) make it to the Lower Mainland.

The more positive responses he got, the more Noble realized he was onto something great: A month-long, comprehensive showcase of B.C.’s craft beer at two of his pubs, the Pumphouse in Richmond and Burnaby’s Hop and Vine.

Noble thought he would get 20 positive replies, maximum. When all the phone calls were done, he was looking at 48.

But how to get hold of it all?

“I couldn’t believe how many people wanted to participate, even though there was no real benefit to them,” says Noble, who ended up visiting 16 breweries in person with Funnell, with the rest being picked up at rendezvous points or delivered by the breweries themselves.

“This is beer going to places they’ll never be, they’ve got no real aspirations to go there. They just loved the whole idea of supporting B.C. Craft Beer Month.

“So I said to the brewers, if you’re willing to put in the extra time to brew extra beer for us and package it, I’ll come and get it.

“It just took a life of its own.”

(The road trip plan did have its limits though. Due to some logistical hiccups, the final tally of participating breweries settled at 40. Impracticalities included Plan B Brewing in Smithers: There wasn’t a mutual meeting point close enough.)

Noble was clearly going out on the limb for these people. As he points out, driving all the way to Oliver for the equivalent of a keg and half of beer makes for a pretty expensive pint when you factor in the gas.

“Definitely not a profitable endeavour,” he adds with a chuckle.

But then, most of the brewers were going out of their way for Noble. And it’s clear that Noble was hugely inspired to carry out his scheme by their enthusiasm for it, and their everyday passion and positivity.

“The common thing along the whole way was that these are guys who literally have just themselves, or themselves and one or two other people,” Noble says.

“And they’re built just to maintain. They’ve got their couple of accounts, or they’re a brewpub and they brew what they need, that way they don’t waste much.

“It just makes more work for these guys,” he adds. “It’s not like they clock out early and work on these side projects.

“Like at Wolf Brewing [in Nanaimo], when we got there, they’re all working extra hours just to try to bottle this product and put liquid into kegs for us.

“The owner of the Barley Mill [brewpub in Salmon Arm] said: ‘You realize it would have taken me personally three days consecutively just to can the beer?’

“It’s a one-man operation, doing it Canada time. There’s no automated equipment, it’s him and his canning machine, filling the cans and then putting the lids on top.”

Arriving back home, exhausted, overwhelmed and having amassed a staggering 112 different beers, Noble faced days of paperwork, marketing strategies and the daunting logistical challenge of storing all the beer he and Funnell had squeezed into that three-tonne and how best to serve it all.

The final plan was prettu simple: Starting Oct. 1, the Pumphouse and Hop and Vine have been showcasing a different B.C. brewery every day, with sleeves 10 per cent off the regular price.

It’s attracted great interest, Noble says.

“We’re seeing people come to Burnaby from different areas, like Port Coquitlam, Surrey, Langley, White Rock. I was in Richmond [at the Pumphouse] the other night and there was a group of girls that had come from Aldergrove. Just for a strawberry ale.”

Chris Funnell (centre) with new Moon Under Water owners Clay and Chelsey. (Photo: Micah Noble)

But don’t despair that the end of B.C. Craft Beer Month is fast approaching.

Noble stocked up on so much beer that his beer showcase will likely extend well into November, and maybe beyond. And there’s always next year. (Noble seems keen, Funnell a little less so.)

But before that, there’s a slightly more pressing concern for Noble and his crew.

“It’s all got to go back!” he wails. “[The breweries are] all small, so they don’t have a large inventory of anything, including kegs. They all need their kegs back.

“So the guy in Oliver is like, my sister comes down there sometimes, I’m going to connect you with my sister.

“The guys in Tofino are like, sometimes we come over and just crash with friends, check out the city for a few days.

“The guy from Longwood is coming over to meet his brother in November.

“So it’s not just like they gave us the beer and we were all done. Now comes the next two or three weeks of, how do we connect? Do you have a cousin or an uncle or an aunt or some distant relative that happens to be in the Mainland that’ll be going by your direction?”

And, chuckling, Noble finishes with another anecdote derived from his epic trip:

“Chris is calling a brother-in-law who lives in Edmonton because he knows he’s coming to town and figures that on his way back from Vancouver to Edmonton he might be able to stop in a couple of places with these kegs.

“So here’s a poor guy on his family trip with his wife and kids and a few empty kegs on his back seat.”

“Losing the brakes is definitely an interesting thing when you’re in a truck with a couple of palettes of of beer, heading downhill and gaining on the car in front of you. I turned to Chris and said, ‘I think we’ve got a small problem. I don’t think we have any brakes any more.’

“And we had a completely lucid conversation. He said, ‘So, what exactly qualifies as a big problem?’ And I was like, ‘Well, when we hit the car in front of us.’

“With both feet firmly pressed on the brake pedal using my back to leverage against the back of the cab, we managed to get it slowed down enough.”

“We lost the brakes to the truck outside of Parksville coming down a hill. We were fortunate there was a mechanic shop that wasn’t too far away from Wolf Brewing. We walked to the brewery in around 15 minutes.

“The gentleman there was fantastic. When we told him we were without a vehicle and temporarily delayed, he just gave us the keys to his car. I had known him for about five minutes at that time. First time we’d ever spoken.

“… Initially he was like, ‘if there’s anywhere I can drive you, or anything I can do to help out. I can drive you somewhere, you guys can get dinner and call me when you’re ready and I’ll pick you up.

“And then he was like, “Skip that, just take my car.” And this was a relatively brand new car in mint condition. And we’d just met him. We were kind of stunned.”

“There were a few [brewers] that just surprised us, like Big Ridge in Surrey there, they’re a brewpub and when I contacted [brewmaster Tariq Khan], I said, ‘We know you’re a brewpub, I also know you make really good beer but you don’t sell to anyone, what are the odds you could sell me a keg?’

“And he said, not a problem. And I asked, any idea what you’re going to give us? And he said, ‘Not a clue.’ And I said ‘Perfect, see you next month.’

“That’s just what we were dealing with. I’ve still no idea what [beer] it is, I’m picking it up next week.

“The slight realization that we were half asleep approaching a ferry and that a three-tonne truck would not fit through a car stall, or at least we believe that’s what the large hand gestures frantically waving us away were as we approached the front kiosk.

“And I think she was right in hindsight, there probably wasn’t any way we were going to fit through there.”

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